‘we’re poised for strong growth in 2022’

Restaurant Brands International Inc (NYSE: QSR) on Tuesday said a 65% YoY growth in digital orders helped fuel its profit and revenue above Street estimates in the fiscal fourth quarter. Shares are up 4.0% this morning.

What Restaurant Brand’s Q4 report tells us

Restaurant Brands said its net income printed at $261 million versus the year-ago figure of $138 million. On an adjusted basis, it earned 74 cents per share. At $1.55 billion, its net sales noted an annualised increase of 14%.

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According to Refinitiv, experts had forecast 70 cents of adjusted EPS on $1.50 billion in revenue. Globally, digital made up 30% of the total quarterly system-wide sales, as per the earnings press release.

Restaurant Brands attributed the strong Q4 results to its pricing power and said further hikes are likely in 2022 to offset inflationary pressures. On CNBC’s “Squawk on the Street”, CEO Jose Cil said:

There’s tremendous pricing pressure. But we’ve done a great job over the years of building relationships with suppliers and distributors. So, we were able to use our scale to mitigate some of those impacts. Although, our focus is on creating consumer demand. So, we’ve been cautious on that.

Comparable sales were up 10.3%, 11.3% and 14.7% at Tim Hortons, Burger King, and Firehouse Subs, respectively, but down 5.8% at Popeyes. RBI returned $610 million to shareholders in Q4 and opened 1,200 net new locations in fiscal 2021. The chief executive added:

A tremendous resilience in our business makes our franchisees view it as a secure long-term investment. With a combination of great master franchisees, great unit economics, resilient business model, and great brands, we’re poised for really strong growth in 2022 and beyond.